Excelsior... Nation

‘Hijack’ was false
alarm: Shahnawaz

NEW DELHI, Oct 4: The "hijack" of an Alliance Air Flight from Mumbai to Delhi that triggered a four-hour-long drama at the Delhi Airport after midnight ....more

Narayanan warns
international community
against adopting selective
approach

NEW DELHI, Oct 4: President K R Narayanan today warned the international community against adopting ‘selective approach’ in fighting terrorism, stating ...more

Passengers aghast
over "false alarm"
theory

NEW DELHI, Oct 4: With the Kandahar hijacking episode still fresh in their memory, several passengers ........more

Goa Panchayat, villagers
swear by Constitution to
bury caste row

VERLA CANCA (GOA), Oct 4: It was an unusual function to be held at a public crematorium. The gram panchayat.....more

Southern states also
vulnerable to quakes

NEW DELHI, Oct 4: Southern states, which were considered comparatively safe from earthquakes, have also become vulnerable and strategies to minimise loss of life and damage to property should be incorporated in national programmes relating to earthquakes.......more

Greening of Pujargaon

PUJARGAON (UTTARANCHAL), Oct 4: Four decades ago, this non-descript village ensconsed in the hills of Tehri district of Uttaranchal was ....more

Matchmaker, matchmaker,
find me a match...

CHENNAI, Oct 4: Matchmaking may have undergone a sea change with the internet revolution, but tradition continues to take the front seat in any .....more

Indian masters to teach
Yoga in Taiwan

JAIPUR, Oct 4: Indian masters have been invited to to teach Yoga at a 17-day autumn camp in Taiwan, the Yoga Sadhana Ashram here said today. .....more

‘Hijack’ was false alarm: Shahnawaz

NEW DELHI, Oct 4: The "hijack" of an Alliance Air Flight from Mumbai to Delhi that triggered a four-hour-long drama at the Delhi Airport after midnight last night and kept everyone on tenterhooks turned out in the end to be a ‘false alarm’.

The reports of the "hijacking" of the Boeing 737, carrying 46 passengers and a crew of six, were "not true", Civil Aviation Minister Shahnawaz Hussain told reporters early this morning, after a meeting of the Government’s Crisis Management Group.

The drama began with an anonymous call received by the Air Traffic Control at Ahmedabad that Flight CD 7444 had been "hijacked". The ATC duly warned the pilot, the minister said.

Mr Hussain said an inquiry would be ordered into the origin of the hoax call received by ATC, Ahmedabad, but declined to provide details.

The aircraft of Alliance Air, a subsidiary of the state-owned Indian Airlines, was the last to leave Mumbai for the national capital, taking off at 2315 hrs yesterday.

For four hours from midnight, there was high drama at the Delhi Airport, where the aircraft had landed at 0052 hours today and at the Rajiv Gandhi Bhavan, headquarters of the Civil Aviation Ministry, where the Crisis Management Group met.

Soon after the plane landed, it was taken to an isolation bay at the Delhi Airport, where commandos of the elite National Security Guard surrounded it.

A fuel tanker was placed in front of the aircraft to prevent it from taking off.

Some time later, some of the commandos entered the cockpit and realised that there were no hijackers on board.

According to Mr Hussain, the pilot thought the hijackers were in the passenger cabin and the passengers thought the hijackers had entered the cockpit.

This led to confusion on the aircraft and forced the authorities in Delhi to launch full-scale emergency measures. More than 100 policemen, several ambulances and fire tenders stood by.

A little after 0400 hrs, the 46 passengers and six members of crew aboard the aircraft were able to finally leave the aircraft hale and hearty, much to the relief of their anxious relatives, who had started gathering at the airport soon after news of the hijacking broke around 0130 hours.

The tension at the airport during the intervening period was quite real, with almost all those involved ignorant of the fact that there was no hijack in the first place.

For many of the relatives, the event brought alive chilling memories of the December, 1999 hijacking of an Indian Airlines flight from Kathmandu to Delhi.

Mr Hussain said a passenger had entered the cockpit saying he was an employee. He, however, did not have any pass. This created the confusion about the "hijack".

The pilot of the aircraft spoke to Home Minister L K Advani, who was attending the meeting of the Crisis Management Group at Rajiv Gandhi Bhavan.

Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee was kept posted about the developments at regular intervals.

The passengers had conflicting tales to tell as they emerged from the terminal at around 0430 hrs and related their accounts to the vast contingent of mediapersons who had converged at the airport.

The entire airport machinery had geared up well before the "hijacked" Boeing 737 aircraft landed at Palam Airport, with a large number of policemen surrounding the entire complex and fire tenders, ambulances and bomb disposal squads positioned at strategic points.

There was a pregnant silence as security personnel went about their drill amid reports that NSG commandos were taking positions for a possible storming of the aircraft, parked in a remote bay close to the international terminal.

Panicky relatives paced up and down in and around the arrival terminal while a battery of mediapersons followed them to extract every bit of information that they gathered from the passengers on mobile phones.

There was a lot of scepticism among mediapersons covering the entire episode about whether the hijack was for real, with many of the pieces of information coming their way not quite falling into place.

They were, in particular, baffled by the fact that passengers on the aircraft were communicating freely on mobile phones with their friends and relatives outside the airport.

Some of the anxious relatives even offered their cellular phones to journalists to talk to the passengers who asserted they were safe.

Some television channels broadcast excerpts from conversations with a few such passengers.

One of the passengers, K S Jain, talked to his brother, Vinod Jain, who shared the information with the media saying there was an announcement in the plane about a technical fault and those on board were safe.

Another passenger Ajay Golcha talked to his brother Rajesh Golcha at 0215 hrs. "I have not seen the hijackers, there is no panic and all the passengers are safe," Ajay informed his brother.

As the tension-filled moments ticked by, restive relatives and reporters waited for information from airport authorities and the Crisis Management Group which was meeting in Rajiv Gandhi Bhavan.

Confusion reigned supreme at the airport and was compounded further when reports starting trickling in, quoting the Civil Aviation Minister, that it was a "false alarm" that had led to the crisis.

Categorically denying that it was a mock exercise, the minister told reporters at Rajiv Gandhi Bhavan that he was satisfied over the manner in which the security and other personnel had responded to the crisis. He said this showed they were prepared for all eventualities.

"It was not a mock exercise, nor a planted exercise. The ATC, Ahmedabad, had received a phone call and the message was sent to the pilot. We had accepted it as a hijack," he said.

He said ever since the September 11 terror attacks in the United States, the Government had been receiving many such calls. Today’s incident proved that the Government was prepared to meet any eventuality, he said.

"We had accepted it as a hijack and were prepared with all contingency plans. The developments were monitored every minute. When we came to know that it was a false alarm, the passengers were allowed to get off the plane. All passengers are safe and are being sent home," he said.

Mr Hussain said: "No chances were taken. We are happy that it proved to be a foolproof system. All security measures were given full attention."

Officials said attempts were made to establish contact with the "hijackers" as reports came in that the pilot had asked for two engineers.

The two "hijackers" were said to be speaking in broken english. Some reports went on to say that they had knives and bombs and also a packet which they claimed contained RDX.

Officials said the pilot had locked the cockpit door from inside.

There were also reports that suggested that the "hijackers" initially wanted to take the aircraft to Lucknow.

The Government’s Crisis Management Group was convened shortly after. Apart from Mr Advani and Mr Hussain, the meeting was attended by Mr Brajesh Mishra, Principal Secretary to the Prime Minister and National Security Adviser, Foreign Secretary Chokila Iyer, Civil Aviation Secretary A H Jung and intelligence chiefs.

As television channels started telecasting detailed reports on the "hijacking", anxious relatives of the passengers on the aircraft began arriving at the airport.

Scores of journalists landed up at the airport as well as the Rajiv Gandhi Bhavan to report on the "crisis". The airport set up help lines for the relatives of the passengers.

Security alerts were also sounded at Mumbai and other airports in the country.

In Delhi, Civil Aviation Secretary A Jung told reporters that the ATC was in touch with the pilot till Ahmedabad, but after that the contact was lost.

According to him, the "hijackers" wanted the plane to land on a runway close to the airport building, but the authorities prevented it by switching off the runway lights.

It finally landed on another runway and was taken to the isolation bay.

An Alliance Air official, who did not wish to be identified, meanwhile maintained during the crisis that it was a hijack and that the commandos had completed their operation by nabbing the two hijackers by storming the plane after deflating its tyres.

"Following a call from Ahmedabad ATC, the hijack Signal was radioed on the radar by pilot Ashwini Bahal and co-pilot Sameer Sahay at 0012 hrs," he claimed. "About 60-80 nsg commandos were involved in the operation."

As the curtain rang down on the hijack drama and passengers started emerging from the terminal, journalists had a harrowing time piecing together their conflicting versions. (UNI)

Narayanan warns international communityagainst adopting selective approach

NEW DELHI, Oct 4: President K R Narayanan today warned the international community against adopting ‘selective approach’ in fighting terrorism, stating such a stand would ‘smack of the doctrine of differential rights.’

Inaugurating the conference on international law here, Mr Narayanan said, "I sincerely hope that in the effort to smoke out the enemy, let not the international coalition adopt a selective approach. Terrorists who pose a threat to the civilian populations and the elected Governments must be eliminated wherever they be,"

He said terrorism has now emerged as a sinister phenomenon threatening "our civilised existence."

India has lost thousands of lives because of the cross-border terrorism during the past two decades. "We were using every forum available in the world to voice our concerns and remind the world that this scourge must be wiped out before it overwhelms us," he said adding, "nobody paid much heed to us. Now a global coalition is formed to smoke out the enemy."

Mr Narayanan said it was unfair to say that the terrorist attacks on America represented the so-called clash of civilisations. "Every efforts must be made to drive home the point that it is not civilisations which clash, but barbarism. Civilisations give rise to dialogue, cross-fertilisation of ideas and the confluence of different streams of mankind," the President added.

The President said the international law has not taken a definite shape to eliminate political and economic conflicts among nations, inspite of emergence of the pluralistic world.

In this era of geo-economics in which nations and groups of nations were pursuing adversarial goals with commercial means, there was a possibility that nations with lesser economic potentiality might be marginalised.

Mr Naryaranan said the international law must address such issues so that developing countries interests were not jeopardised. The international law must reflect character of the one world based on the democratic concept of equality before law and equal protection of laws.

Referring to globalisation, he said it did not mean the extinguishing of the sovereignty of nation states or the establishment of what had been called a borderless world. It did not mean the abolition of the distinctiveness of human individuality.

International law will thus be "the law that leaps the sky" of which sophocleus spoke, the law that unites this vast and disparate humanity in harmony and justice, he added. (UNI)

Passengers aghast over "false alarm" theory

NEW DELHI, Oct 4: With the Kandahar hijacking episode still fresh in their memory, several passengers of the "hijacked" alliance air flight expressed anguish and disgust over Government attributing the incident to a "false alarm".

"This is not the way to test how the security apparatus functions. If real hijack takes place, what will happen," said an angry K Jain, a passenger of CD-7444 flight from Mumbai to Delhi, alighting from the aircraft after nearly a four hour captivity.

While some passengers felt that the entire exercise was "mock", a few others termed it as hundred per cent real hijack but none of them claimed to have seen the hijackers.

"We were told by some commondos that we are safe now," said Darshan Singh, another passenger, adding "we were also conveyed that two of the hijackers had been nabbed."

However, chaos and confusion reigned supreme at the Delhi’s Palam airport which witnessed a four hour long hijack drama and some of the anxious relatives were seen having a verbal duel with senior police officials arguing about the black out of the news.

Even though the Civil Aviation Minister Syed Shahnawaz Hussain said that the entire episode was a "false alarm", an Alliance Air official, refusing to be identified, claimed "it was real hijack and the elite National Security Gaurd commandos entered the aircraft through the landing gear into the cockpit and nabbed the two hijackers."

Another passenger Anil Kumar Bhandari said "we suspected something was wrong as there was an abrupt halt to the aircraft after it landed at the Delhi airport."

Narrating the incident, he said the entire lights inside the plane went off and "we saw several vehicle with sirens atop approaching the aircraft. However, we were not sure as to what had happened." The entire airport presented the look of a fortress with a heavy possee of police and nine brigade personnel and ambulances taking position to handle any eventuality. (PTI)

Goa Panchayat, villagers swear by Constitution to bury caste row

VERLA CANCA (GOA), Oct 4: It was an unusual function to be held at a public crematorium. The gram panchayat members and villagers read out preamble of the Constitution, swearing to maintain equality and not to discriminate against anybody on the grounds of caste, creed and religion.

Village panchayat sarpanch Mohan Sawant led the villagers to take the oath by reading out the preamble of the constitution yesterday evening in the presence of Mr Justice Chandrashekhar Dharmadhikari, a retired judge of the Bombay High Court, at the crematorium where a controversy had erupted last month when a section of upper caste people objected to the cremation of a body of a person who belonged to a scheduled caste community.

After brief functions at the village panchayat office and at the crematorium, a "Samata Melava", a convention of equality, was held at the nearby Mapusa town where the speakers appreciated the stand adopted by the village panchayat not to discriminate against anybody in the crematorium and not to allow construction of any separate sheds for different communities in the public crematorium.

Speaking at the convention, Mr Justice Dharmadhikari expressed confidence that the incidents that took place in Verla Canca last month and the manner in which the youth took initiative to solve the problem, by creating awareness among the villagers, would go a long way in spreading the message of equality and peaceful coexistence.

"Let this tiny village become a nucleus point of a strong movement against all forms of caste discrimination," he said. Intervention of organisations like Goa Peoples’ Front, Yuganayak and Samata Andolan and All Goa Students Union, which had a series of discussions with the panchayat members and both the factions during the last fortnight, brought about a truce between the two groups belonging to upper caste and scheduled caste.

Tension started brewing in this village last month when the members of a scheduled caste community cremated a body at the main crematorium, departing from their age old custom of burying their dead in an area separately earmarked for them in the crematorium compound. Those who objected to it came out with the argument that earlier the sc community used to bury their dead, unlike the upper caste who consigned the mortal remains to flames.

After this incident, the crematorium committee called in seven priests and reportedly performed a "ceremony" at the crematorium, which the sc community alleged as a "purification ceremony" after cremation of a dalit.

As tension flared over this issue, the crematorium committee later clarified that that was just a religious ceremony after renovation of the old crematorium and not not a "Shudhikaran" (purification) as alleged.

Meanwhile, another member of SC community died on September nine. Determined to overcome discrimination against their dead, the SC community decided to cremate him at the main crematorium and also sought police protection, fearing that those who were opposed to it might create trouble.

The village panchayat and administration were then caught between the devil and the deep sea. Some of them felt that allowing the SC community to cremate their dead in the area being used by "upper castes" would hurt the latter’s sentiments while not permitting them would amount to breaking the laws pertaining to the prevention of atrocities against scheduled castes.

However, the village authorities and the police managed to convince the SC community to stick to their original place by offering to erect a platform in their area to be used as funeral pyre. Subsequently, the cremation took place without any untoward incident.

But the decision of the village panchayat added fuel to fire. It started construction of a separate crematorium shed for scheduled castes, that too using funds it received from the Rural Development Agency (RDA), sparking protests from sc community and various social organisations.

Agitated over the events, a delegation of Goa Peoples’ Forum comprising lawyers, doctors, journalists, artists and senior citizens, called on the Panchayat Minister Manohar Azgoankar and submitted a memorandum protesting against the panchayat’s decision to construct a separate shed for performing the final rites of members of scheduled caste communities. They also urged the Government to find out whether similar type of treatment was being meted out to the dalits in other villages also.

Subsequently, the Panchayat Director issued a circular to all panchayats, block development officers and other revenue officials drawing their attention that discrimination of dalits is an offense punishable under Untouchability (prevention) Act. It also stated that any construction of separate sheds be stopped immediately in view of it being an offense.

According to Goa Peoples’ Forum convenor advocate Satish Sonak, the issue had to be tackled at two levels. While the State Government has to ensure that its funds are being utilised for welfare of public in general without any discrimination of caste, creed, class or religion, it was also necessary to create awareness among the villagers against casteist feelings and practices.

"The incident also brought to light the need for sensitising and educating elected representatives at the grassroot level, as these people can play a major role in social reforms and tackling such situations", he added.

Meanwhile, a complaint lodged by the members of SC community with the police over the incidents of ‘caste based discrimination’ at Verla Canca is pending investigations. Now the members of SC community members say that it was upto the police to act in accordance with the law. "As long as our rights are safeguarded, we will not agitate", they added. (UNI)

Southern states also vulnerable to quakes

Prof V S Ramamurthy, Secretary, Department of Science and Technology (DST), said since there was no technique available in the world for prediction of earthquakes, focus of national earthquake programmes should be on understanding their phenomena, preparedness strategies, provision of immediate relief and long-term settlement. For this, huge amounts of investments were required.

Prof Ramamurthy, who was speaking at an international conference on "seismic hazard with particular reference to Bhuj earthquake", called for synergy between all programmes and research connected with earthquakes and strict enforcement of new building codes.

Organised jointly by the Department of Science and Technology (DST) and the India Mateorological Department (IMD) and attended by more than 150 scientists from india and abroad, it deliberated among other things on various technical and scientific aspects of earthquakes.

Inaugurating the conference yesterday, Minister of State for Science and Technology Bachi Singh Rawat said India had prepared a latest global seismic-hazard map which would be useful in planning land use and designing buildings around probable earthquake-prone zones.

The map has been prepared by the National Geophysical Research Institute (NGRI), Hyderabad.

Mr Rawat said the IMD had initiated a number of steps to strengthen and upgrade the seismological monitoring capabilities in the country which could be compared to international standards.

The upgraded network with the state-of-the-art equipment has successfully demonstrated its capabilities by generating for the first time high-resolution digital broad-band data for regional earthquakes.

The DST has also been supporting major research-oriented multi-institutional projects on seismology. The data collected is being used for understanding the earthquake processes and the physics of the earth’s interior.

In the wake of the recent earthquake in Bhuj, the Government has further intensified efforts and initiated new projects like earthquake risk evaluation centres, mission-mode project on natural hazard assessment, radio telemetry systems in select areas and micro-zonation of Delhi and other important cities.

The minister said that since Indian landmass is highly earthquake prone, preparedness should be the immediate goal. (UNI)

Greening of Pujargaon

PUJARGAON (UTTARANCHAL), Oct 4: Four decades ago, this non-descript village ensconsed in the hills of Tehri district of Uttaranchal was arid and devoid of vegetation. Not a single blade of grass grew there and most males migrated elsewhere in the country in search of jobs.

And then came Vishweshwar Dutt Saklani, a man who grew up with the arid surroundings of Pujargaon.

It was during the early 1960s, that Saklani set himself the task of greening his dreary village.

He has carried on the mission for 40 years now, planting over 5 lakh saplings.

At 80, Saklani says he will plant saplings till his last breath.

With several awards to his credit, including the prestigious Indira Priyadarshani Vrikshamitra Award, Saklani now dreams of setting up a University of Environment Studies in his village.

According to Saklani, the idea of greening Pujargaon began in early 1960s when his first wife was on death bed. "When my first wife died, my love for nature deepened," confesses Saklani adding he had inherited the tradition of planting trees from his forefathers.

"If Pujargaon is green today, it is largely due to the efforts of Saklani", villagers say adding that he has devoted virtually his entire life towards the upkeep of environment. He single-handedly planted over five lakh trees that include oak, pine walnut, deodar and other varieties in and around Pujargaon.

With the crack of dawn, Saklani is out in the woods, perched at a height of over five thousand feet, planting saplings and throwing seeds.

Walking briskly through the woods with the help of a walking stick, Saklani countinues his daily chore of planting trees and nursing them till dusk. "They (trees) are just like my children and I have nursed them like a mother," Saklani says

During the day, he takes a break for his simple meal of "dal and roti" and gets back to business thereafter. "I only take dal and roti and at times, I don’t eat at all." However, he attributes his fitness to the austere life he leads.

What is the motto of life? "like a tree, we must branch out to help the needy people," he says. Pointing towards a tree he planted forty years back, Saklani asks: "Tell me what sort of lesson we can get from a tree?" he himself gives the reply too. "If you throw a stone at a tree, you only get fruits. Similarly in life also, one must give something to the society in whatever form one can. I am not preaching anything, but this is a fact of life," he says. (PTI)

Matchmaker, matchmaker, find me a match...

CHENNAI, Oct 4: Matchmaking may have undergone a sea change with the internet revolution, but tradition continues to take the front seat in any process leading up to marriage in the country, especially in Tamil Nadu, which has seen an exodus of eligible youth to foreign shores.

In the bygone era, a girl used to meet her prospective groom in the drawing room in the presence of relatives and friends.

Not any more.

The "sophisticated platform" called the internet allows prospective partners to exchange pleasantries without nosy relatives or neighbours butting in.

This is an especially preferred mode for those settled abroad. Most matrimonial advertisers are from the US, a smaller percentage from the UK, followed by the Gulf region, Singapore and Australia. Despite the slowdown in the IT sector, the queries are pouring in.

Though the medium used is modern, the contents of most matrimonial advertisements continue to be Archaic, with little progress when it comes to issues of caste and looks. People still want "fair, good looking" brides and engineer or doctor grooms.

Few advertisements carry the "caste no bar" tag. But, even those who specify caste and sub-sect expect the respondents to be "broad-minded, loving and caring".

A section in such portals has grateful couples posting messages of thanks.

Says Mrs Srinidhi Balaji on one of the oft-visited portals, "we had lunch once before the wedding, shared our views and thoughts and discussed the future. I was happy to know that he did not have any bad habits. We continued to communicate through e-mail and phone. We understood each other quite well and got married within a month’s time. We thank tamilmatrimony.Com for bringing us together".

For some, such a meeting results in a great business idea. Murugavel Janakiraman, who met his wife through an website, decided to float the ten-language bharatmatrimony.Com. He is now the CEO and Chairman of the portal, which was started with an investment of 100,000 dollars.

It claims to make a profit of 3,000 dollars a month and says it has brought together 140 couples.

Glancing through the matrimonial postings, it is clear that software is the preferred profession, despite the slowdown. The demand for MBAs has taken a downswing. A nevertheless, a software engineer with an MBA is welcome.

"The internet is of great help to those who live miles away and want to marry a person in India with traditional values, but do not have access to newspapers carrying matrimonial advertisements," says R Vaidyanathan, a UK -based software professional.

Regional channels also have a share in the pie. A recent programme "Kalyana Malai", telecast on Sun TV, allows people to choose from a bevy of applicants. It also sticks to tradition — the horoscopes are shown along with the photographs.

Despite the internet boom, organisations that have been offering free matchmaking services continue to flourish. Their USP —networking within a particular community and passing every horoscope through the watchful eyes of astrologers.

The ubiquitous brokers too have managed to survive. (UNI)